If you’re like most people, you daydream about retirement as the ultimate reward for giving your all throughout your career. Whether you envision a beachside home, investing more time and money in your hobbies, or globetrotting, you probably are counting on a rosy financial picture to buoy your dreams.
It’s like what Michael Scott once said on The Office:
Money has been a little tight lately. But, at the end of my life, when I’m sitting on my yacht, am I gonna be thinking about how much money I have? No. I’m going to be thinking about how many friends I have, and my children, and my comedy albums. I mean, I have a yacht, so I obviously did pretty well money wise.
Of course, not everyone gets their yacht. And there’s a new service to help people realize exactly what leaving the workforce will mean for them.
Marcia Tillotson and Joy Kenefick, two financial sages with Wells Fargo Advisors in Charlotte, N.C., run a “retirement boot camp” for people a year or two away from retiring.
The yearlong program aims to help people realize what they need to do to avoid outliving their savings. Participants have to live on reduced incomes while still paying their mortgages, insurance premiums, and other fixed expenses that don’t disappear just because you’ve left your job.
As a result of the exercise, the advisors say, 8 out of 10 participants choose to defer retirement by at least a year.
Inspired to put a little something extra into your 401(k)? Read more here about how that could translate into major money for you when you need it most.
2 Comments
Are they also preparing you for unplanned events such as the bankruptcy of your previous employer?
I explain: This may come as shock to you, but in Canada for example, unlike the US or the UK, there is no pension protection plan.
So if a company goes bankrupt, its pensioners lose a big chunk of their pension if the pension plan was in deficit at the time of bankruptcy.
This is exactly what is happening now with the ex-telecom gian Nortel Networks which went into bankruptcy protection in 2009.
So in countries like Canada even if you have planned well your retirement you are not completely protected!
Once people get a chance to see the whole financial picture along with the small Social Security Check. It is no wonder they decide to continue working for at least one more year. I wonder how many decide to continue working indefinitely?